Iran Makes Arrest Over Second Deadly Blast in Tehran in Week
(Bloomberg) -- Iranian authorities detained one person and were seeking at least four others over a deadly blast at a clinic in Tehran, the second major explosion to rattle the capital in less than a week.
The city's attorney general, Ali Alghasi Mehr, said the people were wanted for their potential involvement in the blast late on Tuesday, and that a judicial investigation had been launched, according to the semi-official Iranian Students' News Agency.
In the immediate aftermath of the explosion, which killed at least 19 people in the busy Tajrish neighborhood, Tehran's fire department blamed a leak in gas tanks on the building's basement floor.
But on Wednesday, the head of Tehran City Council's Health Commission, Zahra Sadr-Azam Nouri, said initial investigations indicated a fault in the electricity network connected to oxygen tanks kept in unsafe storage rooms was responsible. In comments carried by ISNA, Nouri said the fire department had repeatedly warned the clinic about safety measures but that it had never fully complied.
Mobile-phone video showed a large plume of smoke rising from the clinic as onlookers gathered. Twenty people escaped via windows and balconies.
There was no indication that the incident was linked to a blast at a military installation near Tehran last week, in which a gas leak was also blamed.
Iran said that explosion took place at Parchin, which is thought to have played a role in the country's nuclear program. But The New York Times reported Tuesday that satellite imagery showed the incident actually struck a nearby missile-production facility.
Together the explosions jolted a nation being ravaged by the region's worst coronavirus outbreak while locked in a tense standoff with the U.S.
As the first reports of Tuesday's explosion surfaced, the latest chapter of their standoff was unfolding. U.S. Secretary of State Michael Pompeo urged the United Nations Security Council to extend an expiring arms embargo on Iran as world powers from China to Europe pushed back against U.S. threats to reimpose UN sanctions on Tehran if the weapons ban lapses.
©2020 Bloomberg L.P.
-
Opinion | India at 38: From Innovation Overperformer to Innovation Powerhouse
India now has 453 VC-backed deep science startups, 18 of them late-stage, after 117 percent growth since 2020. Laurus Labs, at USD 9.3 billion, is the most valuable deep science company in any middle-income economy outside China.
-
Navigating Energy Crossroads: S Jaishankar's Call For Diversified Supply Chains At G20 Ministerial Meeting
As geopolitical fault lines continue to test maritime trade routes and commodity flows, Jaishankar's message remains pertinent: true economic resilience requires open markets, protected transit lines, and a genuine commitment to multilateral cooperation rather than coercion.
-
Indians Are Travelling, But Not Every Journey Is A Holiday | The Week In Whys
Pilgrims, patients and working women are the real travellers, and the system hasn't quite caught up with them.
-
Getting To Work Costs Women More | The Reason Why
It is not just about women paying more than men. It is about women paying much more in cities than in villages.
-
AI Bias In Investing Cannot Be Eliminated, But It Can Be Governed
Framing is a particularly important example as identical financial information presented in terms of gains rather than losses can lead an LLM to reach a different assessment.
-
Joining The Dots | Dark Skies, Steady Diya: Why Hope Holds This Diwali
With war, a weak rupee and foreign outflows weighing on sentiment, policymakers at the NDTV World Summit and market veterans at NDTV Profit Ignite: Diwali Edition offered the same advice: stay invested and filter out the noise.
-
The Curious Case of Equitas Small Finance Bank And A CEO Who Quit For Stock
PN Vasudevan believes persistent investor concerns over a perceived conflict of interest had become a governance overhang on Equitas Small Finance Bank's stock, even as the lender improved profitability and asset quality.
-
Talking Points This Week: AI Cash Burn, A Tiger Comeback And An India That Still Finds Its Own Path
India is not immune to higher oil or tighter global liquidity, yet its earnings base is broader, its domestic policy levers are still available.
-
Foreign Investors Own Half Of HDFC Bank and ICICI Bank. An LTCG Cut Could Matter Most Here
Foreign portfolio investors have US$115 billion parked in HDFC Bank, ICICI Bank. If the government cuts long-term capital gains tax, Jefferies says returning foreign money could land here first.
